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Comment by nirvana | Hacker News Reader

I read recently that the Mac Pro accounts for less than %2 of Apple's Mac sales.

Since thunderbolt basically is a PCI express cable, there's nothing to stop people from building external cases that can hold PCI express cards, like the Mac Pro can. Since thunderbolt is becoming prevalent across the line, I can't really see a need for the Mac Pro so much anymore.

True it is nice in some situations to put all your hard drives and all your PCI cards in one box, but at %2 of the total sales (by units) the big old tower is less relevant these days.

The other thing the Mac Pro had was the highest end of Intels CPUs. If the sales aren't making the engineering effort worth it, then the answer Apple's intending people to take may be a high end iMac.

I edit a lot of HD in Final Cut X on my 2 year old Macbook Pro, and background rendering seems to have no trouble keeping up. I've not really felt CPU constrained in awhile with HD.

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I think it's funny that Apple markets itself as simplifying and reducing wires and reducing clutter... but boy, they like adaptors!

A wire is a commitment, an adapter is a training wheel. The intent is for you to grow out of needing it. Apple's guesses about what you'll eventually stop needing have been pretty good so far (e.g. ditching floppy drives, going to USB-primary early).

Those were really early decisions. What about Mini DisplayPort/Thunderbolt? I still rather had DVI on my Mac Mini. What about Ethernet? Anyone who needs it in a wired company is likely stuck with it.

And one more ugly piece of plastic that many people ruin their Macs with - USB 3G sticks, because no Mac series can hold a SIM card, even though Apple has successfully pushed for a more compact standard.

So 3g radios magically work through sim cards now? I actually think not including CDMA/GSM protocol of the year antennaes is a better future proofing move.

The radios typically included in new laptops are pretty sophisticated, with the right firmware, one card works on pretty much any network in the world.

Future proofing a box with a non-user replaceable battery? They don't want future proof, they just have other gadgets to sell to the people that want mobile connectivity.

> Future proofing a box with a non-user replaceable battery

My battery lasts 6 to 7 hours and is more than two years old. I can't remember the last time I had to stay six hours straight without having a plug nearby long enough to pump up some serious juice (and remember, charging is non-linear, the first 80% come up in a blink). Swapping batteries is a niche, yet it's the standard in PC land. I'd rather have a couple more hours in a thinner enclosure than twice but at the cost of lugging around a bulkier design, along with the second battery. Plus recharging two batteries is a chore.

A battery isn't a 3g radio, and what happens if you put in hsdpa and all of the sudden the lte bands being used are different?

The battery analogy is flawed.

In general this is true, but there's at least one thing you never grow out of needing: more storage. And until now the mac pro is the only one with expandable internal storage. On top of that most apple software[1] don't deal well with network storage, so it's twice as bad for some users.

[1]especially time machine and aperture but a lot of others as well

It's improving the base model look and size for the majority at the cost of adapters for the outliers. Apple has always been consistently designing for mass market appeal for the past decade. If you are an outlier, Macs are not for you.

What is the opposite of "If you are an outlier, Macs are not for you"? Is it, "If you are average, you should buy a Mac"? That doesn't sound like a very good marketing tactic.

No, it doesn't, but the quality of the "opposite" is rarely a relevant indicator – if you tried to recruit people into the pro-choice movement, you'd have a far harder time if you called it the "anti-life" movement.

I also think it's funny that Apple marketing switched so strongly from "Think Different, personalise your stuff" to "You will all be the same, abandon choice"

Maybe it's because I'm used to seeing Macs in businesses, but I've never known a MBP user who didn't carry along a VGA dongle.

there's nothing to stop people from building external cases that can hold PCI express cards, like the Mac Pro can.

Such a thing has been announced: http://www.magma.com/thunderbolt.asp

then the answer Apple's intending people to take may be a high end iMac.

Maybe, but the 3.4GHz i7 - currently the highest CPU in the iMac range - still comes in at 2-3x slower than the highest end current Mac Pro CPU.. and there are E5 Xeons out there already faster than those.

Very cool, but wow I wasn't expecting the price to be at almost a grand.

Oh Goad, magma is so SHIT. We've had one of their offerings in the 2000's and it smoked a high-end piece of hardware when it died. Cause? Very shitty chinese psu that went up in flames on its own. It was just after warranty, so they didn't take it back. In retrospect reminds me of this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZDh8z9UDTo

Please, please don't use magma. It's for your own good.

I read recently that the Mac Pro accounts for less than %2 of Apple's Mac sales

What % of media and apps consumed on other Apple kit is created on Mac Pros? Are all the devs and videographers etc using laptops now?

FWIW my dev setup is a MacBook Pro connected to a Cinema Display.

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